Friends, Lovers, Chocolate id-2

by Alexander McCall Smith

  Brother Fox, who was looking at her from the garden, although she could not see him. He was looking at her through the win-2 4 6

  A l e x a n d e r M c C a l l S m i t h dow, wondering whether the head and shoulders he saw behind the desk were attached to anything else, to legs and arms, or were a different creature altogether, just a head-and-shoulders creature? That was the extent of Brother Fox’s philosophising; that and no more.

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  IAN HAD EXPRESSED DOUBTS, as she expected he would, but finally he agreed.

  “It’s simply a matter of going to see him,” she said. “See him in the flesh.” She looked at him and saw that he was not convinced. She persisted. “It seems to me that there is an entirely rational explanation for what has happened to you. You have received the heart of a young man who died in rather sad circumstances. You have undergone all the psychological trauma that anybody in your position might expect. You’ve been brought up against your own mortality. You’ve . . . well, it may sound melodramatic, but you’ve looked at death. And you’ve har-boured a lot of feelings for the person who saved your life.”

  He watched her gravely. “Yes,” he said. “All of that is right.

  That’s how it has been. Yes.”

  “These emotions of yours,” Isabel went on, “have taken their toll. They have to. They’ve been translated into physical symptoms. That’s old hat. It happens all the time. It’s nothing to do with any notion of cellular memory. It’s nothing to do with that at all.”

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  A l e x a n d e r M c C a l l S m i t h

  “But the face? Why should the face be that of his father?

  His father—not my father.”

  “The father of the heart,” mused Isabel. “That would be a good title for a book or a poem, wouldn’t it? Or, perhaps, The Father of My Heart. ”

  Ian pressed her. “But why?”

  They were sitting at one of the tables in Cat’s delicatessen during this conversation. Isabel looked away, to the other side of the shop, where Eddie was handing a baguette to a customer.

  He was sharing a joke with the customer and laughing. He’s come a long way, thought Isabel. She turned back to face Ian.

  “There are three possibilities,” she said. “One is that there really is some sort of cellular memory, and frankly I just don’t know about that. I’ve tried to keep an open mind, but the more I’ve thought about it, the more difficult it becomes to pin much on it. I’ve looked at some of the literature on memory, and the general view is that there just isn’t any convincing evidence for it—what there is seems anecdotal at best. I’m not New Age enough to believe in things for which there’s no verifiable evidence.” She thought for a moment. Was this too extreme? Some qualification might be necessary. “At least when it comes to matters of how the human body works. And memory is a bodily matter, isn’t it? So where does that leave us?

  “The next possibility is sheer coincidence. And that, I think, is a more likely possibility than one might at first think. Our lives are littered with coincidences of one sort or another.”

  “And the third?” asked Ian.

  “The third is an entirely rational one,” said Isabel. “Some time, somewhere, after you had your operation, you saw something which pointed to the fact that the donor, your benefactor, was a young man called Gavin Macleod. Then, perhaps at the F R I E N D S, L OV E R S, C H O C O L AT E

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  same time, you saw a photograph of Gavin’s father. You may not even have been aware that your mind was reaching these conclusions.”

  “Unlikely,” said Ian. “Very unlikely.”

  Isabel raised an eyebrow. “But isn’t the whole thing completely unlikely? Isn’t it unlikely that you would have had these symptoms . . . these visions? Yet that is all very real to you, isn’t it?

  And if something that unlikely can happen, then why shouldn’t there be further levels of unlikelihood?” She paused, assessing the effect of her remarks on him. He was looking down at his feet, almost in embarrassment. “What have you got to lose, Ian?”

  For several minutes he said nothing, and then he had agreed, with the result that now they were making their way out to West Linton, with Isabel at the wheel of her old green Swedish car.

  She rarely drove this car, which smelled of old, cracked leather and which, in spite of being largely neglected, never once in all its years had refused to start. I shall keep this car until I die, she had decided, a decision which had made her feel bound to the car in a curious way, as life partners are bound to each other.

  Ian was silent, tense beside her. As they negotiated their way out of the Edinburgh traffic, he stared out of the window, balefully, thought Isabel, like a man on his way to punishment, a prisoner en route to a new, remoter jail. And even as they passed Carlops, and the evening sky to the west opened up with shafts of light, he did not respond beyond a murmur to Isabel’s remarks about the countryside. She left him to his mood and his silence, but just before they reached West Linton itself, he pointed to a house some distance off the road, a large stone house with windows facing a stretch of moor. The last rays of the sun had caught the roof of this house, picking it out in gold.

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  A l e x a n d e r M c C a l l S m i t h

  “I stayed there,” he said casually. “I spent three weeks there when I was recuperating. It belongs to friends of ours. They invited us to come and stay.”

  Isabel glanced at the house and then back at Ian.

  “You stayed in that house?”

  “Yes. Jack and Sheila Scott. They’re friends from university days. Do you know them?”

  She steered the car over to a small patch of grass at the side of the road and drew to a halt.

  Ian frowned. “Is there something wrong?”

  Isabel turned off the engine. “I wish you’d told me, Ian,”

  she said.

  He looked puzzled. “About Jack and Sheila’s house? Why should I have told you about that?”

  “Because it provides the answer,” she said. She felt angry with him, and there was an edge to her voice. “Did you go into the village itself ?”

  “From time to time,” he said. “I used to go and browse through the bookshop. You know it?”

  Isabel nodded impatiently. “Yes, I know it. But tell me, Ian, would you have seen people while you were there?”

  “People? Of course I saw people.”

  She hesitated for a moment. They were near, so near to the solution. But she did not know whether she dared to hope that it could be so neat and tidy.

  “And spoke to people?”

  He looked out of the window at the grey-stone dyke that followed the side of the road. “It’s difficult to find dry-stane dyk-ers,” he remarked. “Look at that one. The stones on the top have fallen off. But who can fix them these days? Who’s got that feeling for stone?”

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  Isabel looked at the dyke. She did not want to talk about that now. “People,” she repeated. “Did you speak to people?”

  “Of course I spoke to people,” he said. “I spoke to the man who runs the bookshop. He’s a composer, isn’t he? I spoke to him and sometimes I spoke to people who came into the shop.

  He introduced me to some of the customers. It’s very villagey, you know.”

  Isabel knew that she could not expect the answer she wanted to the next question, but she asked it nonetheless. “And did you meet a vet?” she asked. “A vet who lives in the village, quite close to the bookshop?”

  “I have no idea,” he said. “I might have. I can’t remember it all that well. I was still a bit fuzzy round the edges then, you know. It was not all that long after I had left hospital.” He turned and looked at her, almost reproachfully, she thought.

  “I’m doing my best, Isabel. You know, this isn’t very easy for me.”

  She reached out and took his han
d in hers. “I know you are, Ian. I’m sorry. It’s just that we’re very close now. So let’s not talk about it any further. Let’s just go and see him. He’s expecting us round about now.”

  H E H A D J U S T R E T U R N E D from work and was still wearing his jacket, a green waxed-waterproof. One of the pockets in the front was bulging with what looked like a bottle of tablets.

  Beneath the jacket she glimpsed a red tie which she recognised: the Dick Vet in Edinburgh, the university veterinary school.

  He opened the door to them and gestured for them to come in.

  “This place is a bit of a bachelor establishment,” he said. “I mean to tidy it up, but you know . . .”

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  A l e x a n d e r M c C a l l S m i t h Isabel glanced about her. It was not unduly untidy, she thought, but it was spartan, as if nobody really lived there. She stole a glance at Euan Macleod: there were the high forehead and the eyes; yes, he was not unlike Graeme. But his was a kinder face, somehow, a gentler face.

  “You said that you wanted to see me about Gavin,” he said, as he motioned for them to sit down. “I must confess, I was a bit surprised. You know that I am separated from my wife? You know that we’re divorcing?”

  Isabel nodded. “I know that.”

  Euan looked directly at Isabel as he spoke, but there was no note of challenge in his voice. “So that meant that I didn’t see the children very much. In fact, my wife made it more or less impossible for me. I decided not to make a fuss. Only the youngest is under eighteen. The other two could decide for themselves in due course.”

  Isabel caught her breath. This was a different story from his wife’s, but of course one expected very different accounts of a marriage ending in an acrimonious divorce. Both parties could rewrite history, sometimes without even realising that that was what they were doing. Both could believe their own accounts.

  “I’m sorry about what happened to your son,” she said.

  He lowered his head in a gesture of acknowledgement.

  “Thank you. He was a very nice boy. But that illness . . . well, what can one say? Such a waste.”

  “Yes,” said Isabel. “But there was something salvaged from the tragedy. And that’s what we came to tell you, Mr. Macleod.”

  He started to speak—something she did not catch—but lapsed into silence.

  “Consent was given by your wife to the use of your son’s heart,” she said. “He was the donor in a transplant. And my F R I E N D S, L OV E R S, C H O C O L AT E

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  friend here is the person who received it. This is why he is alive today.”

  Euan’s shock was visible. He stared at Isabel, and then he turned to Ian. He shook his head. He put his hands over his eyes.

  Isabel rose to her feet and approached him. She put a hand on his shoulder. “I can imagine what you’re feeling,” she whispered. “Please, I do understand. The reason why we came to see you is that Ian, my friend, needed to be able to say thank you. I hope you understand that.”

  Euan took his hands away from his eyes. There were tears on his cheeks. “I didn’t see him,” he said quietly. “I couldn’t face it. I couldn’t face the funeral. I just couldn’t. I couldn’t go . . .”

  Isabel bent down and placed her arms about him. “You mustn’t reproach yourself about that. I’m sure that you were a good father to him, and to the others.”

  “I tried,” he said. “I really did. I tried with the marriage too.”

  “I’m sure that you did.” She looked at Ian, who rose to his feet and joined her beside Euan.

  “Now listen to me very carefully,” she said. “Please listen.

  Your son is living on in the life of this man here. And this man, who owes your son so much, has come to you because he needs to express his gratitude. But there’s another thing—he can say to you that farewell that you and your son did not exchange.

  Look. Look.” She reached out and took Ian’s hand and turned it over, to expose his wrist. “Put your hand there, Euan. Can you feel that pulse? Can you feel it? That is your son’s heart. Your son would forgive you, you know, Euan. Your son would forgive you anything that you felt needed forgiving. That’s true, isn’t it, Ian?”

  Ian began to say something, but could not continue, and so he nodded his assent and clasped the hand above his, firmly, in 2 5 4

  A l e x a n d e r M c C a l l S m i t h a token of forgiveness and gratitude. Isabel left them together for a few moments. She crossed the room to the window and looked out on the village, at the lights and the darkening sky.

  Rain had set in, not heavy rain, but a gentle shower, drifting, soft, falling on the narrow village street and her green Swedish car and the hills, dark shapes, beyond.

  “I see that it has started to rain,” she said. “And we must get back to Edinburgh soon.”

  Euan looked up. She saw that he was smiling, and she knew from this that she had been right; that something had happened in those moments, something which she had thought might happen, but which she had not allowed herself to hope for too much, for fear of disappointment. I am often wrong, thought Isabel, but sometimes right—like everybody else.

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  GRACE PUT THE MAIL on Isabel’s desk.

  “Not very many letters this morning,” she said. “Four, in fact.”

  “What matters is the quality,” said Isabel, shuffling through the envelopes. “New York, Melbourne, London, and Edinburgh.”

  “Edinburgh is the fish bill,” said Grace. “Smell the envelope. They write the bills out in that funny little office they have at the back of the shop. Their hands smell of fish when they do it. One can always tell the fish bill.”

  Isabel raised the plain brown envelope to her nose. “I see what you mean,” she said. “Of course, people used to send perfumed letters. I had an aunt who put a very peculiar perfume on her letters. I loved that as a child. I am not sure whether I’d be so keen on it now.”

  “I think that we come back to these things,” said Grace. “I loved rice pudding as a girl. Then I couldn’t touch it. Now I must say that I rather look forward to rice pudding.”

  “Didn’t Lin Yutang say something about that?” mused Isabel. “Didn’t he ask: What is patriotism but the love of the good things that one ate in childhood?”

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  A l e x a n d e r M c C a l l S m i t h Grace laughed. “Grub first, then ethics. That’s what I say.”

  Isabel began to say, “Brecht . . . ,” but stopped herself in time. She picked up the envelope which bore the New York postmark. Slitting it open, she extracted a letter and unfolded it.

  For a few minutes she was silent, absorbed in the letter. Grace watched her.

  She was smiling. “This is a very important letter, Grace,” she said. “This is from Professor Edward Mendelson. He’s the literary executor of W. H. Auden. I wrote to him, and this is his reply.”

  Grace was impressed. She had not read Auden, but had heard him quoted many times by her employer. “I’ll get round to reading him,” she had said, but they both doubted if she would.

  Grace did not read poetry—Grace’s razor.

  “I wrote to him with an idea,” said Isabel. “Auden wrote a poem in which he uses imagery which is very reminiscent of Burns. There are lines in ‘My love is like a red, red rose’ about loving somebody Till a’ the seas gang dry. You remember those, don’t you.”

  “Of course,” said Grace. “I love that song. Kenneth McKel-lar sings it beautifully. He made me fall in love with him. But there must be so many people who fell in love with him. Just like they all fell in love with Plácido Domingo.”

  “I don’t recall falling in love with Plácido Domingo,” said Isabel. “How careless of me!”

  “But Auden? What’s he got to do with Burns?”

  “He taught for a short time in Scotland,” said Isabel. “As a very young man. He taught in a boarding school over in Helens-burgh. And he must have
taught the boys Burns. Every Scottish schoolchild learnt Burns in those days. And still should, for that matter. You learnt Burns, didn’t you? I did.”

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  “I learnt ‘To a Mouse,’ ” said Grace. “And half of ‘Tam O’Shanter.’ ”

  “And ‘A Man’s a Man for a’ That’?”

  “Yes,” said Grace, and for a moment the two women looked at one another, and Isabel thought: This is one of the things that binds us together—in all the privilege of my life, in all that has been given to me through no effort of my own, I am bound to my fellow citizens in the common humanity that Burns spelled out for us. We are equal. Not one of us is more than the other.

  We are equal—which was the way she wanted it; she would have no other compact. And that is why when, at the reopening of the Scottish Parliament after those hundreds of years of abeyance, a woman had stood up and sung “A Man’s a Man for a’ That,” there had been few hearts in disagreement. It was the rock to which the country, the culture, was anchored; a consti-tution, a charter of rights, written in song.

  “I wrote to Edward Mendelson,” Isabel went on, “because I thought I could detect Burns—the influence of Burns—in one of Auden’s lines. And now he’s written back to me.”

  “And said?”

  “And said that he believes it possible. He says that he has some correspondence in which Auden says something about Burns.”

  Grace’s expression suggested that she was not impressed. “I must get on with my work,” she said. “I’ll leave you to your . . .”

  “Work,” said Isabel, supplying the word that Grace might have uttered in quotation marks. She knew that Grace did not regard the hours she spent in her study as real work. And, of course, to those whose work was physical, sitting at a desk did not seem unduly strenuous.

  Grace left her, and she continued with the rest of the corre-2 5 8